When taken back to the station-house, Captain Lefroy, who was at the head of the police, introduced me to Mr. Pinching, surgeon of the same corps. The captain, in a gentlemanly way, inquired if I would allow Mr. Pinching to reason with me on my opinions? I said, 'Certainly.' Mr. Pinching asked me the irrelevant question 'Did I believe in Jesus Christ?' and began a dry, historical argument to prove that there was the same evidence for the existence of Jesus Christ as for that of Henry the Fourth. I said, 'The argument is unnecessary with me. I do not care to argue whether he existed or not. My inquiry is not whether he lived, but what he _said._' Mr. Pinching's next speech was delivered with an air of sharp authority, and he began to address me rather rudely.
He asked me was it not Robert Owen who made me an atheist? I replied, Mr. Owen himself was not an atheist. For myself, I had not become so till after the imprisonment of Mr. Southwell, which had led me to inquire into the grounds of religious opinion more closely than I had before done, and it had ended in my entire disbelief.
Mr. Pinching now became impatient and abusive, allowing me no opportunity of replying, and I said 'Stop! stop! sir, you must not treat me as a prisoner if you intend me to hear you. Unless you converse with me upon equal terms I shall not answer you.' Lefroy laughed, and said, 'Come! come! Pinching, I think you are not quite fair. After this Mr. Pinching became more abusive, and I turned away--when he ended the conversation by saying, 'I am only sorry the day is gone by when we could send you and Owen of Lanark to the stake instead of to Gloucester gaol.'
Not allowed to wait twenty-four hours to see if I could obtain bail, I was soon after sent off to Gloucester, nine miles away, the same afternoon, where the difficulty of negotiating my release was so much increased that it took me a fortnight to do it.
After my conversation with Mr. Pinching I was shut up in a very filthy place with a lousy man. I was handcuffed with small old irons that pinched my wrists, and I begged to have another pair of handcuffs put on, which was done: then I was made to walk through Cheltenham town and suburbs, and afterwards through Gloucester city, with the hand irons on. As I had walked thirty miles to be apprehended, they had no reason to suspect me of making my escape; nor was it customary to handcuff prisoners conveyed to Gloucester on foot. In my case it was done to pain and degrade me.